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Sand Surfing in Picardy and Sailing in Normandy
By Linda Thalman
We spent a weekend in Fort Mahon Plage in Picardie, exploring the beach
Hunters were
hunting ducks, beachcombers were scavengering
for interesting pieces of wood, folks were walking their dogs, some were digging for mussels.
And then for the sand surfing challenge...
Wouldn't you be frightened if asked to jump in a 'tank with sail' that has no seat belt or
life boat?
I was scared out of my wits for the first two test runs along the beach
I'm not really sure what char à voile is called in English, but
this 3-wheeled machine with a sail was amazingly fun to drive... fly... sail?
Two weeks later we headed for Dieppe in Normandy for a sailing class on a 10.6 meter boat.
While fully trained following my successful sand surfing, I was still not prepared for
handling a boat in the English Channel!
Memories of a very frightening topsy turvy
sailing weekend a couple of years ago didn't do much to calm my nerves.
Yet, a one in a thousand days picture perfect weekend of clear, calm, warm weather
made our weekend sailing lessons down right enjoyable.
Dieppe comes from the English word 'deep' and it is the closest seaside city to Paris.
It's a charming town with a lovely port for pleasure craft and one for commercial fishing
boats.
Here's an extract in French from:
http://www.normandy-tourism.org/
and you'll find the site in English, French, German, Dutch)
for lots more information on Normandy.
"L'Estuaire de l'Arques, autrefois dénommée la Deep, avait offert un mouillage sûr depuis
l'Antiquité. Les galets accumulés au débouché de la vallée, permirent un cheminement entre
mer et marécages et peu à peu une ville se créa, sur un tracé "naturel" qui existe encore aujourd'hui.
Doyenne des stations balnéaires, la ville ancienne, qu'on découvre au haut de la
falaise, a gardé son tracé moyenâgeux, bien qu'elle ait été reconstruite à la fin du
XVllème siècle à la suite d'un incendie qui ruina Dieppe. L'histoire et l'économie de
la ville sont profondément liées à la pêche et à la navigation. Ville portuaire,
Dieppe recevait de nombreuses marchandises, des épices et surtout de l'ivoire.
Le développement de la sculpture sur ivoire et la prospérité de cet artisanat
qui subit les aléas de l'histoire, contribuèrent à la renommée de la ville."
PICARDIE
HAUTE NORMANDIE
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Email – Linda@wfi.fr
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Copyright since 1995 by Linda Thalman - all rights reserved.
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and bay area of the Authie, north of the Somme.
in my yellow bathtub! But what fun once you get the hang of it and you mustn't worry about
getting soaked head to toe with sea, sand and salt.
Paris
